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New Traditions

Traditions, particularly surrounding holidays, are very comforting. I in particular like the traditions of certain foods that I only make for those holidays. What would thanksgiving be like if i did not make five different pies during the Macy’s parade or Christmas without Beef Wellington? Well, next year, we are facing a break in our Christmas tradition, when two of our grown children will not be coming home and neither of our grandchildren. Can you have a Christmas without the children? The up side is that we will have a house full this year with all the children home at once for the first time in over seven years.

I am not sure about how this is going to work or what new tradition we will develop but I do know one thing, we need to begin planning. While I want everything to remain the same, I realize that it will not happen. Our children are going to continue to grow and we are not the only loved ones in their lives. Thank goodness! We want them to have sound marriages and great relationships with their in-laws.

So how do we figure this out? Do we travel? Do we stay home? Do we do everything as before, just without them?

I don’t think there is any one answer, but I do think it is a good idea to plan. Just waiting to let it happen and hope we have a good holiday might not be a great idea. There is no way that it will be the same. So what new tradition do we add? Well, there are several things we can consider:

*. Add new guests for dinner

* Volunteer to serve dinner at a soup kitchen

* Take a holiday vacation

* Plan a completely different way to celebrate – new food, a play, an outdoor celebration, a traveling meal.

I realize that there are no rules to how to celebrate your holidays. We all have year after year traditions that we have refined over the years and sometimes they just can’t happen. I will plan to do what I can to make a memorable holiday season for my family next year. It will take some planning though. I guess it is time to begin thinking about it now.